Game, SET, Match

Alright, since I spent my last post hyping up liberos/defensive specialists, I believe it's only fair that I do my next post on the next player to handle the ball after the passer: the setter.

To the unaided eye, it may seem that the setter isn't that important, or that her job isn't that hard. However, if you start to think more critically, the setter, in many ways, has the hardest and most important job on the court. 

The setter is like the point guard in basketball, she is the one who decides which plays the hitters are going to run. Plays in volleyball relate to the different kinds of sets the hitters can give the hitter. For example, my high school varsity team had a play called Double D, which meant the outside hitter would go for a hunt set, the middle hitter would hit a one, and the right side hitter would go for a back one. 

If that made no sense to you at all, don't worry, I'll explain in it a further post. Basically, the setter decides which hitter is going to get the ball, and what type of set they are going to get. In the most basic terms, the setter really controls the offense of a team. 

Besides having to make crucial decisions for how a team will run their offense, setters have a very physically demanding job as well. The setter is the only player on the team who touches the ball just about every time the ball comes over the net. And although the passers are supposed to pass the ball right to the setter in the right from position, I speak from experience when I say that this doesn't always happen. Setters often having to go running (and diving) all the way across the court to save a ball. 

I, personally, have always secretly wished that I was a setter. I fooled myself into thinking I could set for one season of club volleyball, but when I returned to my high school team the following year I was awakened from my dream. Although setting looks as though the physical act is easy, I can assure you it's not. Setting is arguably the hardest skill in volleyball to perfect, and it is one of those abilities that most of the best setters you watch are simply born with. (Lucky ducks)

Now I'll get on to the last position in my next post (it's a crowd favorite I guarantee it), but if you want to learn some more about what it takes to be a setter, there is a great article here about some different skills and abilities that setters need to have if they want to be the best at their position. Until next time!